Critical Exposition Essay Comparing Taoism to Socrates

Socrates Conception of Knowledge Epistemology is a theory of philosophy that gives an account of the nature and extent of human knowledge. Alongside metaphysics, logic and ethics, epistemology is the core of philosophy. The main philosopher of this theory is Plato who contributed in explaining the origin of knowledge…

Introduction

It is connected to notions of belief, truth and justification. Meanwhile, Socrates and Taoists have different views on explaining and justifying the theory (Jaakko 32-35). For Socrates, knowledge is universal and even eternal. The universals deal with being, hence, knowledge is through concept. A concept is taken to mean the idea of a group of particulars. The notion of group or class is gotten by comparing a number of particulars under the class and deducing from such comparison what is common and necessary features by doing away with accidental and unwanted characteristics of those particulars. For instance, sheepness is an essential feature in all sheep, but the size and color are accidental attributes of the sheep. Socrates makes a distinction between the universals gotten by conceptual reasoning and perceptual processes. Perception can only produce what is momentary and merely becoming while concept alone can take us to being. Socrates also held the notion of the soul’s immortality its pristine knowledge of the true knowledge of absolute equality, absolute justice, and goodness. He also held the fall of human beings into their ignorant world, cycle of rebirths and of faint recollection of absolute knowledge in their pristine glory. Equal things to us are a representation of absolute equality, since the identified particulars poorly imitate absolute equality. ...

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